Russian and Ingush authorities have become increasingly brazen this month in using utilities cut-offs to pressure refugees in Ingushetia to return to Chechnya. On February 20 the UN High Commissioner for Refugees issued a statement protesting the elimination of gas supplies for ten refugee settlements.... MORE

The masked gunmen who conduct state sanctioned kidnappings in Chechnya often arrive in armored vehicles; this has been considered to be proof that they are federal servicemen. But according to an article in last week's Moskovskie novosti, the members of Akhmad Kadyrov's private army who... MORE

Naidenov also brought back from Grozny some revealing comments on the degree of "normalization" in that city. The city's streets are still deserted after dark, except for the brand new vehicles, with no license plates or other identifying marks, that roam freely. When people see... MORE

This week marked the 60th anniversary of the Chechen people's deportation to Kazakhstan--one of the most atrocious acts of one of history's most atrocious governments. Even if the two Chechen wars of the last decade had not taken place, the events of February 1944 would... MORE

The Kadyrov administration made a deliberate choice not to hold any public, official observation of the deportation's 60th anniversary, according to a February 21 article by Timur Aliev for the London-based Institute for War and Peace Reporting (available via the institute's website at www.iwpr.net). A... MORE

The exact nature of the relations that exist between Shamil Basaev and Russia's security organs have long been a topic of speculation, especially in light of the federal forces' continuing failure to capture the country's most wanted terrorist in such a tiny area as Chechnya.... MORE

Local authorities in a central Moscow district forbade an anti-war demonstration that was to take place in front of the FSB's headquarters on February 23. According to a February 18 account on the Grani.ru website, the demonstrators sought to commemorate the hundreds of thousands of... MORE

Radical changes in the Putin administration's Chechnya policies are unlikely in the few remaining weeks before next month's presidential election, but one can make certain deductions from the way various factions are jockeying for position. Though Kadyrov still enjoys the strong personal support of President... MORE

During the year that recently ended, the federal armed forces suffered an average of at least 200 to 300 deaths every month in Chechnya. That is the estimate given by Denis Trifonov, a military analyst for the British strategic-research center "Jane's Group," in a February... MORE

"Chechenization" should be used not just as a term for the Putin administration's reliance on Kadyrov, suggests Moskovskie novosti commentator Dmitry Oreshkin, but as a metaphor for what Putin's policies in Chechnya are doing to Russia as a whole. For example, October's rigged presidential election... MORE